The books are actually a stealth warning to not act like the Pretty Committee.

One of the things on the Fridge page under Fridge Horror is that these girls are going to be seriously fucked up when they're adults. If any tween girls who read these books figure that out (and I'm sure some of them must have. Tweens are smarter than you think), well, why would they want to act like them? I pray to God that this is true, because if it's not, I really fucking hate these things.

Word of God says she wants the books "to teach readers how to treat and respect themselves and each other in an entertaining way."

Well that is vague.

Seems to be confirmed, surprisingly enough. According to the author here, "[her] point in writing the Clique was not to glorify hate and competitiveness and superficiality among girls...Rather to satirize it and show what real strength is though characters like Claire and Layne".

Plausible, but Massie has been shown crushing on boys. Most sociopaths feel no attraction to anybody.

According to my source, some sociopaths are overly promiscuous. But you have a good point. More sociopathic traits Massie has: views people as objects and not people, early behavior problems in childhood, lack of a realistic life plan, overly self-centered.

Going off of treating people as objects, did Massie ever find herself attracted to a boy because of his personality, his dreams, et cetera? Nope. It was mostly based off "hotness", the status she would have as girlfriend of the boy, or how the boy made Massie feel important. Even Landon's endearing attraction to animals is just Massie seeing her own characteristics in him.

A sequel book will come out taking place after high school

It will be dark and disturbing, but oh so satisfying.

There is a book called Bass Ackwards and Belly-Up that's about a group of girls in their college years and (though written during the same time as the first Clique novel) considered by many (including the author herself) to be a Spiritual Successor. Unfortunately, it's about as far away from Dark Fic as you can get.

Dylan has an eating disorder due to stress and depression caused by Massie

This one should seem almost too obvious.

Pretty much confirmed in the prequel.

Claire is the group's new Kristen

They would be (or were) considered "LBRs" before they were adopted by the Pretty Committee and they both end up being pretty similar to the point of almost being interchangeable.

The Pretty Committee (not so) secretly despises Massie

Throughout the series, there are ample (actually, tons) of hints that the other girls are at least aware that many of their problems stem from Massie's incessant intra-group bullying: Dylan struggles to avoid being bullied over her (perceived) weight, Kristen and Claire are afraid of being labeled as "LBRs" and Aliciajust wants to get Massie out of the way so she can be the new Alpha. Which leads to....

The Cliqueis a Deconstruction - the proof was right there in front of us the whole time!

It's not about other girls being bullied by the Pretty Committee - it's about the Pretty Committee being bullied by itself. Specifically, how the other girls continue to suffer from Massie's bullying, but are too afraid to do anything about it. Not only that, but Massie adds peer-pressure for them to further bully each other.

Since there's probably not a lot of crossover readership between The Clique and the Star Wars EU this warrants background: Joruus C'Boath is a Dark Jedi who, unlike the Emperor and above all things doesn't want to control all people in the galaxy (which he sees as a given anyway) but specifically wants to have complete control of all other Jedi to the point where it makes up his entire motivation and planning in the Thrawn Trilogy (including his repeated and failed kidnappings of Luke Skywalker and Mara Jade to try to bring them to the Dark Side). Massie isn't so much concerned about ruling the other girls at OCD (which she sees as a given anyway). She wants to have power over very specific girls whom she thinks will be worth more of her time. There's even very similar speeches and diatribes given by both Joruus about how Jedi are far superior to normal humans which is eerily similar to Massie's speeches and diatribes about the importance of Girls Like Us

Does this mean Alicia is Grand Admiral Thrawn then?

And Kristen is Captain Pellaeon!

So is Dylan Mara Jade then?

So The Clique is an AU High School retelling of The Thrawn Trilogy!

Massie and/or Alicia's lives took a steep downturn after the events of this series

Katniss is ah-bviously Claire and Peeta is Cam. Glimmer and Clove are Massie and Alicia. "Foxface" would be Kristen, since Kristen is also Layne's (secret) BFF and caught between two worlds, so Layne has her not trying to kill Katniss and Peeta and has her die of an accident. President Coin (in the sequels) would be Mrs. Burns the OCD Principal. I don't know where Dylan would fit in though, or who Rue, Prim and President Snow would correspond to.

This way Kristen gets to live out a fantasy life away from the Pretty Committee where things would be "normal" and she wouldn't have to stress out about maintaining her scholarships; her BFFs would be Layne (Ivy) and a much, much nicer (albeit dumber) version of Alicia (Skyler). She would also have a much more normal family closely resembling Claire's (complete with her own version of Todd - Gabe) in the middle of the country, far away from Westchester.

Instead of being a somewhat shy girl with body issues, she gets to be a confident and proud young lady living out on her own in the Big Apple, living a glamorous life as the au pair of one of the world's most famous and glamorous couples. She still occasionally alludes to her "real" life in how Jessie was treated back in Texas and how Massie (Darla) is still much richer than her.

Think about it: both series are about air-headed fashion and boy-obsessed girls in popular cliques, and both even have a girl named Kristen in it! The Clique would just be a version played entirely straight. Teen Girl Squad predates The Clique by a couple of years so it's entirely plausible.

TV Tropes is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available from thestaff@tvtropes.org. Privacy Policy